Swanton says there is no indication the blast was anything other than an industrial accident.

The blast occurred midevening at the West Fertilizer Co. plant in West, a town of 2,700 about an hour south of Dallas.

A nearby nursing home collapsed, trapping residents in the wreckage, and several hours after the blast fires were still raging in the vicinity.

“The fertilizer plant down here exploded,” said Jason Shelton, a clerk at the Best Western Czech Inn, told the Dallas Morning News shortly after the 8 p.m. explosion.

He described how volunteer firefighters had hurried over to fight a small blaze at the plant that they had spotted.

“It was a small fire and then water got sprayed on the ammonia nitrate, and it exploded just like the Oklahoma City bomb.

“I live about a thousand feet from it and it blew my screen door off and my back windows,” Shelton said. “There’s houses levelled that were right next to it.”

Gail Scarborough, a spokeswoman for the Department of Public Safety, told reporters that 200 people had been injured, 40 of them critically. She said troopers initially used their squad cars to transport casualties from the scene.

Besides the injuries, she said 75 to 100 houses and businesses were damaged or destroyed near the plant.

D.L. Wilson, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety, told Reuters the blast had probably caused “hundreds of casualties.”

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Wilson said people were believed trapped in the collapsed nursing home. As well, several firefighters who had been battling a blaze at the plant just before the explosion were reported missing.

Tommy Muska, the town’s mayor, said at a news conference three hours after the explosion that he didn’t yet know how many people had been injured or killed. He said buildings in a five-block radius from the plant were severely damaged.

Among the damaged buildings was the West Rest Haven Nursing Home, from which first-responders evacuated 133 patients, some in wheelchairs.

Aerial footage from WDFW, a Dallas station, showed dozens of emergency vehicles gathered at the scene. Entry into West was slow-going, as the roads were jammed with emergency vehicles rushing to the town to help out.

Authorities set up a staging area on the football field at the local high school, which was lit up with floodlights. Ambulances and several dozen injured people could be seen being taken away or seated in wheelchairs as they are treated and await transport.

Robinson did not immediately return messages from The Associated Press.

David Argueta, vice-president of hospital operations at Hillcrest Baptist Medical Center in Waco, said more than 100 casualties had been taken to his hospital. Hillcrest CEO Glenn Robinson told CNN that the hospital was seeing “everything from orthopedic injuries to patients that are experiencing serious blood loss.”

Debby Marak told the AP that when she finished teaching her religion class Wednesday night, she noticed a lot of smoke in the area across town near the plant. She said she drove over to see what was happening, and that when she got there, two boys came running toward her screaming that the authorities ordered everyone out because the plant was going to explode.

She said she had driven only about a block when the blast happened.

"It was like being in a tornado," Marak, 58, said by phone. "Stuff was flying everywhere. It blew out my windshield."